exists here in abundance... Pieces of copper, mingled with stones, are found at the water's edge almost around the island - along the inlet - under the strata of steep clay - in the copper formed islets that surround it.

In 1670, a Jesuit missionary named Dablon published an account of "an island called Menong, celebrated for its copper."

When explorers discovered Isle Royale,

Evidence of the earlier mining efforts was everywhere, in the form of many stone hammers, some copper artifacts, and places where copper had been partially worked out of the rock but left in place. The ancient pits and trenches led to the discovery of many of the copper deposits that were mined in the 19th century.[8] The remoteness of the island, combined with the small veins of copper, caused most of the 19th-century mines to fail quickly.

Is Menong really Isle Royale or was there a more mysterious, now lost island somewhere in Lake Superior? It certainly is interesting to think there might be a lost Copper Island that was once part of Michigan's past.